June 10, 2011 – AUSTRALIA – Over-sized rats are taking up residence southwest of Brisbane at Goodna, as residents slowly move back into their flood-affected homes. The Courier-Mail website was overwhelmed with comments from readers complaining of large rats creating havoc in homes from Caboolture and Narangba to the inner-city today. Residents at Bellbowrie, Indooroopilly, Yeronga and Hendra also reported the number of rodents were on the increase. Ipswich City Council plans to unleash a force of fox terriers and pest control council workers to stop the pests next week. Goodna residents have complained rats “the size of possums” were nesting in their homes because of the cooler weather. The situation is believed to be worse because many flood-affected homes are unoccupied. Australian pest control service 1300 Pest Control CEO Paul Byres said the rats posed a real threat to homes in the area. “They chew through power cords, plastic, electrical wiring and can potentially start house fires,” Mr. Byres said. “They carry all sorts of disease, from a health point of view – any sort of fecal or urine traces they leave on surfaces – the bacteria spreads very easily and can cause sickness.” He said residents from surrounding areas, like Willawong northeast of Goodna, were shocked at how bold the rats were. “People are intimidated by them, some get pretty comfortable if there’s enough of them around. “One woman rang and said there was one on her front step, it just sat there looking at her. “If you’ve got things like chickens, dry dog food they’ll come to your home.” Goodna Councillor Paul Tully said rats had become a real problem as residents returned to their homes after the floods. “A lot of absentee landlords have done nothing to clean up their properties – you’ve got long grass and other mess they’re attracted to,” Cr Tully said. –Courier Mail

SOUTH AFRICA – Graphic descriptions – Giant rats as big as cats have killed and eaten two babies in separate attacks in South Africa’s squalid townships this week. Lunathi Dwadwa, three, was killed as she slept in her parent’s shack in the Khayelitsha slum outside Cape Town and another girl was killed in Soweto township near Johannesburg the same day. Little Lunathi was sleeping on a makeshift bed on the floor of her family’s breeze block and corrugated iron home on Sunday night when she died. Her puzzled parents didn’t even hear her scream. When her mother discovered her lifeless body, she saw that her daughter’s eyes had been gouged out. Bukiswa Dwadwa, 27, said: ‘I can’t forget how ugly my child looked after her eyes were ripped out. ‘She was eaten from her eyebrows to her cheeks, her other eye was hanging by a piece of flesh.’ Her father Mncedisi Mokoena said police told him: ‘Nothing could have done that but rats.’ And today police revealed that a baby girl died in the Soweto township when she was attacked by rats while her teenage mother was out with friends. ‘We were called to the scene of the death of an infant due to a rat attack on Monday morning at around 9am,’ said police officer Bongani Mhlongo. ‘The mother of the child was arrested on charges of culpable homicide and negligence.’ Residents of South Africa’s impoverished townships say the giant rats grow up to three-foot long, including their tails, and have front teeth over an inch long. The suspects in the baby attacks are believed to be African Giant Pouched Rats, a species only distantly related to UK rats, but native to sub-Saharan Africa – and the biggest in the world. They are nocturnal, omnivorous and can produce up to 50 young a year. Some tribal people breed them for food. –Mail UK

16 Responses to Nature unraveling: Giant rat plagues being reported across the globe

My girlfriend was over the other night seeking counsel from me as she has been having bad dreams every night. I was said to be in the some of her dreams as well. She described a giant rat that looked also human. She mentioned us wiping blood from our mouths.

Now that I see this…I am recalling her dream profoundly.

Maybe this “cycle” we are going through causes a mutation whereas we all get bigger? Ha! That would be fine by me as I am sick of being short. 😉

The problem in South Africa (where the 2 girls died is that the people have multiplied in their millions – uninterrupted and without considering the results of their actions!!!!! The poor just make babies and our population has increased from 5 million 2 decades ago to 50 million!!!! Only a few people are planting food (the farmers that are currently being killed – and the rest are standing with an outstredched hand waiting for help from the government – they don’t pay taxes and want everything for free!!! Yes, nobody should live like that – but why did they leave their rural homes where they could live better for the cities – greed or need?

Here in Australia rats and mice are often followed by their natural predator- snakes. I read a paper that animals in the wild are also experiencing an obesity phenomenon. Perhaps this is nature preparing us for the ice age and famines that are predicted to occur by switching on genes for fat storing. A bit like hibernating animals storing fat to tide them over the winter. On the other hand fleas carried by rats were vectors for the bubonic plague and I certainly hope that isn’t something we are going to have to deal with. Alternatively these rats could have found growth hormones in research stations which were evacuated when the floods hit these places. I wonder if any of the nuclear waste from hospitals leaked out during the floods and have affected these rats. Actually this one looks like a bandicoot.

Nymphaea, I was trying to think what it reminded me of. Could/would rats and bandicoots interbreed? We always have mice and get the natural predators – don’t like even saying their name as they make me shudder. We get rats too and constantly have baits hidden for them. The last couple of years I have seen ones bigger than ever before but thank goodness not that big.

Sorry Gen for the late response. The posts here move on pretty fast and I have been in and out and must have missed your question. Australian Bandicoots are native to Australia and are actually marsupials and have one or two offspring, whereas rat are rodents and they have more offspring. Bandicoots, If I am not mistaken have reduced in number but they have short gestation periods so have the potential to increase their numbers if the conditions are right. The only way I can see them interbreeding is in the laboratory in some transgenic experiment – if they can insert spider genes into goats to get web filled goat milk , anything is possible with these lunatics.

Bandicoots are so not rare not in qld anyway!!! Go camping and tru e you willhear them!!!Pu food out and trust me wait 30 min and you will see them!!! I took my riend campingwell he nearly went to the toilet in his undies!!! They are a good size but comletly harmlss and def not meat eaters!!!

I watched a special on TV about how giant rats escaped in Florida during the hurricane Andrew event. They are now running loose. Rats are survivors and breed like crazy. I wonder if these are the “wild beasts” the book or Revelation speaks of in the end times. Wow, in numbers this could be a situation like none other.

Recently, I had a dream of fighting a large rat with highly-enhanced movement and strength capablities. A bite from it kills a person as I know (during the confrontation) it has some form of “movie grade” diesease and infection. It was so strong and fast, difficult to hit and requires sustained torching from my flamethrower to take it out. I managed to defeat it without getting a bite and found its bones are so hard to crush. This experience was probably symbolic or literal but it explains the heightened ferocious state of the rats presently and in the near future.

I too, think that animal looks a lot like a possum. They behave similar to rats, and have pouches, but are actually a marsupial, not a rodent. They can live isolated or in groups.. they climb, dig, crawl, swim, and s far as I can tell, will eat anything. anything at all. They also don’t care if their meat is dead or what part of a body it is attached to, Yucky nasty critters. In this country they can carry leprosy. I don’t like them.

I think the “giant” rats loosed from the zoos are capybaras from South America, they are gradually migrating into North America, anyway, following the armadillos. Capybaras like the water, and are a prey animal. Armadillos like grubs and worms and will tear up a garden overnight.

I’m in the US. Check out the dog breed Rat Terrier. The largest offshoot is the Decker Terrier capable of reaching 50 lbs with a terrier’s determined prey instinct. It has been used to hunt and kill wild boar. My pack is standard, 18 to 25 lbs average with one of my girls who is .86 Decker reaching 35 lbs. They kill rat and vermin. That’s what they were bred to do. Not chase and dig out foxes, but to find and kill things that do NOT belong in its territory. They do not eat them, but will stack up a sizable pile of dead rats for me to get rid of. Mine work as a team strategicly. The oldest boy I had, at 23 lbs and 7 years old killed a 30 lb ground hog. You might need to look that one up. It was digging holes in my horse paddocks and risking them getting broken legs. Shiloh took care of it in 5 minutes flat when it chose to turn and fight. Check them out; run a search for Rat Terrier or Decker Terrier.